International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

• USA
  

  Trump Bribes Voters, We Remember 9/11, and Soon the Midterm Election

  21 September, by Dan La Botz

  President Donald Trump convened the first-ever midterm Republican Convention in Dallas, Texas principally to celebrate himself and motivate his base for the coming November 3 national elections where control of both houses of Congress is in play. He told his followers to pretend that he’s on the ballot and to vote for Republicans.

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• Ukraine
  

  Civil and military resistance against Putin in Ukraine

  20 September, by NPA-A Ukraine Solidarity Intervention Group

  Ukrainian society is resisting at both the military and civilian levels. To provide concrete support, an international solidarity convoy will go on the road to Ukraine at the end of November. Ukrainian gains on the front line, even if limited, mark the inability of the Russian army to make decisive territorial advances.

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• Iran
  

  An acute crisis in Iran

  19 September, by Babak Kia

  Unable to win the war, US president Donald Trump is bogged down. The Islamic Republic of Iran is responding blow for blow to the US bombings. With the elections in the US and Israel approaching, Trump and Netanyahu cannot back down. This raises fears of a headlong rush and an escalation of the war.

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• Sweden
  

  Setback for the racist populist right, success for the left

  18 September, by Håkan Blomqvist

  A setback for the racist populist right and a success for the left- by a margin of 50 359 votes. Social Democracy will return to government in spite of its worst election results since the introduction of universal suffrage.

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• Brazil
  

  Dispute in the Supreme Court disrupts elections in Brazil

  17 September, by Luís Leiria

  On one side is Alexandre de Moraes, the judge who led the investigation into and prosecution of the Bolsonaro-led coup against President Lula; on the other is Judge André Mendonça, appointed during Jair Bolsonaro’s presidency. Both are suspected of having ties to the banker responsible for the biggest financial fraud in Brazil’s history.
  With less than a month to go before the presidential elections on 4 October, Brazil finds itself plunged into a crisis that, for the first time, has (…)

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...and the rest of the current issue

• Democratic Republic of Congo

  Constitutional tampering in DRC

• Turkey

  ‘My family is safe’: the Turkish regime’s crackdown on LGBTI+ people

• New Zealand/Aotearoa

  Beyond the Labour Machine: Aotearoa, the Alliance, and the Question of Working Class Independence

• Latin America

  Latin America: Patterns and Pendulum

• Situation in East Asia and Japanese Politics/Economy

  Oppose the Takaichi Administration’s Military Expansion and Constitutional Revision

Recently posted Features

• Series : Bretton Woods, the World Bank and the IMF : 70th anniversary (Part 8)

  World Bank and IMF support to dictatorships

  29 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  After the Second World War, in a growing number of Third World countries, policies diverged from those of the former colonial powers. This trend encountered firm opposition from the governments of the major industrialised capitalist countries whose influence held sway with the World Bank (WB) and the IMF. WB projects have a strong political content: to curtail the development of movements challenging the domination/rule of major capitalist powers. The prohibition against taking “political” and “non-economic” considerations into account in WB operations, one of the most important provisions of its charter, is systematically circumvented. The political bias of the Bretton Woods institutions is shown by their financial support to dictatorships ruling in Chile, Brazil, Nicaragua, Congo-Kinshasa and Romania.

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• Series : Bretton Woods, the World Bank and the IMF : 70th anniversary (Part 7)

  Domination of the United States on the World Bank

  9 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  The concept of the World as a huge bureaucracy, gradually freed from the influence of the US, is actually a far cry from reality. This mistaken conception is revealed in particular by the North American environmentalist Bruce Rich in his insightful book on the World Bank. [1] In real terms, the institution is firmly under the control of the US government which negotiates, with the governments of other major capitalist powers, the policies to be followed within the World Bank, and under its leadership. It has frequently failed to make the effort to reach a consensus with its principal partners (since the end of the 1950s, these are Japan, Germany, Great Britain and France) and it imposes its views directly on the Bank.

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• Series: Governments submit to “Too Big to Fail” banks (part 3)

  Private banks shamefully enjoy a monopoly of lending to the public sector

  8 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  The eurozone banks have the monopoly of lending to the public sector. It is prohibited for the ECB and the eurozone’s central banks to grant loans to public authorities (see box on the ECB). The governments in the eurozone have the possibility of borrowing from publicly owned banks where they still exist, but they do not do so.

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• Series: Governments submit to “Too Big to Fail” banks (part 2)

  Governments make Gifts Galore to Private Banks

  8 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  Government aid is made up of guarantees, and injections of capital in order to recapitalize the banks. In the period from October 2008 to December 2011, €1,174 trillion (9.3% of EU GDP [2] ) worth of guarantees were underwritten by European Governments as a contingency measure. To these guarantees must be added €442 billion (3.5% of EU GDP) of public capital support to banks. During 2012 and 2013 the recapitalizations continued: about €40 billion in Spain in 2012 alone, more than €50 billion in Greece, about €20 billion in Cyprus, €4 billion more for Dexia bank in Belgium, €3.9 billion for Monte dei Paschi in Italy, €3.7 billion for the Dutch bank SNS, €4.2 billion in Portugal on top of the Portuguese bail-out of the Banco Esperito Santo in July 2014., not forgetting Ireland, Slovenia, Croatia This assistance was granted without any government supervision of the use made of the funds. [3]

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